


A Tragedy Condemned

by autumntales



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood and Violence, Canonical Character Death, Dream Smp, Family Dynamics, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Wilbur Soot and Technoblade and TommyInnit are Siblings, in the sense that being a family changes some of what happens after wilbur's death, that being wilbur
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 19:54:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29722410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/autumntales/pseuds/autumntales
Summary: “This is the first time in his life that Techno has ever lived in a world without his twin brother.He turns away from Phil, away from Wilbur, away from Tommy. In a small pocket of untouched grass, he reaches for his wither skulls, and gets to work destroying that world."Or, Techno, Wilbur, and Tommy are brothers, and Philza is their dad. In the aftermath of Wilbur's death, Techno struggles to move on.
Relationships: Technoblade & Phil Watson, Technoblade & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Wilbur Soot & Technoblade, Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
Comments: 4
Kudos: 47





	A Tragedy Condemned

**Author's Note:**

> a few notes:  
> \- this will have brief and vague references to suicide, as per discussion of Wilbur's canonical death  
> \- this mostly sticks close to canon at first, but then it diverges later on as i wanted to explore what would be different about the aftermath of Wilbur's death if Techno, Tommy, Wilbur, and Philza were actually all a family, from Techno's POV  
> \- this is about the characters! not the actual people just want to make that very clear since my friend just explained to me what rpf stands for lol  
> \- hope you enjoy :D

_"What is a ghost? A tragedy condemned to repeat itself time and again?_ _A moment of pain, perhaps. Something dead which still seems to be alive. An emotion suspended in time. Like a blurred photograph. Like an insect trapped in amber._ ” 

\- Guillermo Del Toro, _The Devil’s Backbone_

_\---_

_(What is a ghost?)_

In the cacophony of fireworks bursting into light and blades scraping against each other, one sound rises over the din and ripples through L’Manberg. 

“Where’s Wilbur?” someone asks. _Where’s Wilbur? Where’s Wilbur? Wilbur?_

And then the world explodes. 

Techno sees the blast first, a bright pop of light arcing through the air, sheets of grey stone falling like rain. Next is the sharp slap of sound that bursts through his ears and rattles his teeth, then the ground around him starts to shiver. He tosses his trident up into the air, lifting himself off the ground before it gives way, and lands on a nearby roof. From up here, he can see the smoking, slumped remains of the country, still trembling with the aftershocks of the explosion. 

He appraises the damage. The gaping crater like a mouth edged with protrusions of stone teeth. The persistent, tottering walkway that still stands, now a bridge over the water rushing into the hole. The others, all scrambling to get away from falling chunks of dirt and stone or standing around staring, disbelieving or outraged or both. 

He would say that things are going quite well. 

Through the ringing in his ears, he hears Niki’s voice, choked with emotion: “L’Manberg . . .”

This knell ripples through the ruined country, too, like the explosions, like the question asked earlier and now answered. _L’Manberg, L’Manberg, L’Manberg._ Wilbur’s L’Manberg is gone. From his vantage point, Techno can see straight ahead to the room. That room. He knows the one. It was Pogtopia’s worst kept secret, but now it’s bared to the whole world, the wall torn away by the explosions. If he squints, he can make out Wilbur’s form, gesturing out at the destruction and facing another— _Philza?_

Techno drops down to the ground again, hurrying forwards onto the narrow bridge of stone and cobble and scorched scraps of red carpet until it falls away into a newly implemented waterfall. He stops there, craning his head up to look into the room. For a brief, stupid moment, he doesn’t even really register the others running up around him, jostling each other around the edge of the crevice in their haste. Tommy, Quackity, Ponk. He remembers with a jolt that these people are not his friends anymore, they have made that abundantly clear, and he really should just kill them now, turn his crossbow on them or nudge them off the edge and laugh as they fall, but he doesn’t. 

Because in that tiny room across the chasm of L’Manberg is his father. 

Techno has not seen Phil in a long time. Phil has been away, doing important things. Important things do not always involve Techno, which is fine, it’s fine, but they certainly do not involve Wilbur. And yet, there they are. Standing together, Phil’s hands half-reaching towards Wilbur, a sword dangling from Wilbur’s hands. Talking, although Phil keeps glancing sharply at the rest of them huddled around the newly formed crater. 

“Philza?”

“Phil? What is he doing here?”

“What—”

They are all close enough to the room that they can witness Phil take the sword from Wilbur’s hands and plunge it into his chest, but far enough away that none of them have a chance to do anything at all—stop him, help him, say goodbye. 

Everyone is screaming again, but they sound distant, muted, as if underwater. Techno stares straight ahead, straight at Phil, who slowly turns his head away from Wilbur’s body, slumped on the ground. He sees the small crowd amassed there and locks eyes with someone. 

“Philza?” says Tommy. 

There is blood splattered on the front of Phil’s shirt. Resignation, heavy and dark, settles in the lines of Phil’s face. 

“Philza just killed him,” says Techno, unnecessarily, because basically the whole SMP just watched that happen. A laugh bubbles unbidden out of his throat. He’s dead. He’s actually dead. 

This is the first time in his life that Techno has ever lived in a world without his twin brother. 

He turns away from Phil, away from Wilbur, away from Tommy. In a small pocket of untouched grass, he reaches for his wither skulls, and gets to work destroying that world. 

_\---_

_(A tragedy condemned to repeat itself time and again?)_

The first time Techno sneaks back into L’Manberg after blowing it up, he doesn’t plan on going to the room. He plans on going to see Phil and then get out before anyone catches sight of him and goes, _oh hey, there’s the guy that spawned a bunch of withers and killed lots of us several times, let’s get him!_

He ends up in the room anyway. 

The signs Wilbur put up are all still clinging to the walls; his scrawled symphony surrounds Techno as he climbs inside. Techno’s always been more of a charge-ahead-ask-questions-later kind of person, but something about this room demands the kind of cautiousness he would usually reserve for approaching wild animals, or Tommy when he’s being annoying. He moves slowly into the room like the ground will crumble beneath him if his footfalls are too heavy. When he reaches the dark stain of dried blood where Wilbur had bled out, he stops before he steps into its circumference. It’s a large stain, for a lot of blood. Nobody bothered to clean it. Why even try?

He turns his head to gaze out at the chasm of L’Manberg. Although most of it has been rebuilt now, he can place all the pieces in their phantom positions from that day in his mind: him and Tommy standing side-by-side over there, the aftermath of the explosions still rattling in the distance. Techno squares his stance in the place where Phil had stood when he killed Wilbur. His hand clenches and unclenches around the memory of a sword. 

“Technoblade?”

The voice is soft and lilting and not like Wilbur’s at all, but it still makes Techno flinch. Ghostbur doesn’t bother him, usually. He has exactly zero opinions on Ghostbur, usually. He just was not expecting to run into him here. In the room. 

Ghostbur drifts past him, hovers next to the button and glances around. He looks more solemn than usual, and as his gaze alights on Techno’s face he hugs his arms around his torso. “What are you doing here?” he asks. 

“What am _I_ doing here? What are you doing here?” 

Confusion unspools across Ghostbur’s pale grey brow. “I’m not sure,” he says. “I don’t remember this place. What is this place, Technoblade?”

“Uh,” says Techno. 

Ghostbur spins around and presses his hand cautiously, reverently, against the wall where _L’Manberg_ is written. His palm covers the _L._ “I don’t like this place.”

“I thought you don’t remember it.”

“I remember not liking it.”

“Fair enough.” Techno scuffs his boot against the bloodstain. “I don’t like it, either.”

At that, Ghostbur turns to face him. “Really? For some reason, I thought you might.” Then he glances down. “What’s that?”

Techno steps over the bloodstain. “Nothin’.”

Ghostbur still looks at the ground. It is, after all, a very obvious bloodstain. “I feel like I’ve been here a lot.” His voice is thin and frayed like a loose thread. 

Techno has the strangest inclination to reach out and grab his arm, punch him on the shoulder or pull him into a hug and never let him go, but he’s afraid that if he tries to touch the ghost his hand will glide right through him. And then he will have to deal with that. So he keeps his hands at his sides, and says, “You know, I—” Ghostbur stares back at him, eyes wide and unsure. Techno shakes his head. “Never mind. It’s a completely different situation, really.”

“What? What’s wrong?” asks Ghostbur. 

This is his chance. This is what he’s been waiting for since he watched Phil kill Wilbur right in front of him, since Phil whispered to him later, in passing, like it was inconsequential, like it was nothing— _he asked me to do it._

This is what he has come to this room for, right? A chance to puzzle it out, take the fractured pieces of Wilbur’s last moments and stitch them together into a shape that makes sense. To find out why, and for what, and was it worth it? Was there anything Techno could have done to save him? Will he ever stop feeling guilty for his glee in the moments just before, watching L’Manberg fall without any clue Wilbur intended to follow close behind? 

But now, watching Ghostbur gaze warily around the room, he understands how foolish that desire is. He is too well-versed in sacrifice to pretend there is ever a reason for it that makes sense. He is too deep in his guilt to believe there is any way to keep his head above the water. 

_Why weren’t you keeping an eye on Wilbur?_ Quackity had shouted at Tommy then. But Tommy was just a kid doing everything he could. It was Techno who should have known. Wilbur was his—he just should have known. 

“Nothin’,” he says instead. “I’m fine.”

“Oh, alright then,” says Ghostbur. “We should get out of here. Here, take some blue.”

Techno takes the blue dye and climbs out of the room. Carefully, because Ghostbur has gone through enough without having to witness Techno slip and plummet to his death. 

“What are you up to, anyway?” asks Ghostbur, floating down beside him. 

Techno drops the last few feet onto solid ground and quickly surveys the horizon, but no one is around. “Lookin’ for Phil,” he responds. 

Ghostbur’s expression brightens. “Oh, Phil. How nice.” Then he slows to a stop, a peculiar expression passing over his face like a dark stormcloud. “Has Phil been in that room before?”

Techno stops too, but he doesn’t turn around to look back at the ghost. “He . . . yes. Do you remember that?”

In the brief swell of silence before the answer, he opens his mouth again to say, _nevermind, forget I asked, I actually don’t want to know,_ but Ghostbur can’t see the hesitation in his face because Techno hasn’t turned around, so Ghostbur says, “I do remember that. He was only there once, though.”

There’s really nothing to do now but keep walking away, so he does. 

_\---_

_(A moment of pain, perhaps.)_

When the self-proclaimed Butcher Army drags Techno to his execution site in L’Manberg, he is surprised by a lot of things—the cage, the anvil—but mostly by the fact that Phil is there. He’s standing at the railing outside of his house, looking down at them as they all climb out of their boats and Carl leaps up out of the water. In an instant, Quackity points his sword at Techno. “Don’t fucking move,” he says. 

Techno holds his hands up. “Wasn’t plannin’ on it.” As soon as Quackity turns to grab Carl’s reins, Techno runs. “Phil!” he shouts. Phil steps closer to the railing, and something around his ankle glimmers in the bright sunlight. “What happened?”

“I can’t leave my house,” Phil calls. He points at his feet. “They put this ankle monitor on me.”

Someone snags Techno’s cloak and he whirls around, fists flying. Ranboo stands before him, hand outstretched, eyes wide, and while he probably has the least amount of bones to pick with Ranboo compared to the rest of them, he’s too mad to care. After everything, they can’t just let them go? “Leave Phil alone,” he snarls, angling his punch towards Ranboo. His fist connects with Ranboo’s armor, and then he goes flying backwards and hits the ground hard. Pain arcs across his knuckles. 

“Come on.” Techno glances up to see a scowling, Carl-less Quackity standing above him. Quackity gestures with his sword. “Get in the cage.” 

Techno gets in the cage. Phil watches from above. Neither of them say anything to each other, but Phil gives him a terse, somewhat encouraging nod, gripping the railing tightly. Techno nods back at him. G _o back inside,_ he thinks, _don’t watch this,_ but Phil doesn’t move. Dread coils deep in Techno’s gut. 

And then someone shouts, “Punz?”

Techno whirls around just in time to see the bright red blocks of TNT strung across the ground. Punz darts around placing them as the others scurry behind him, breaking them as quickly as they can and yelling at him fruitlessly. It’s certainly an interesting development. Not that Techno can do much about it anyway, as he is still locked inside a cage. 

“Technoblade!” 

Techno stifles a sigh, then shuffles around. Ghostbur crouches by the stairs behind him, one hand petting the thick, wiry wool of a blue sheep. “I’ve named him Friend!” he calls. 

“That’s fantastic, Ghostbur,” says Techno. He leans his arms against the bars of the cage as Ghostbur grins up at him. “I’m about to die, Ghostbur.”

The placid smile on Ghostbur’s face ripples and breaks, a lake with a stone thrown into it. “What?” 

And then— “Fuck it!” shouts Quackity. “I’m doing it. I'm pulling the lever.”

Techno scrambles to grab his hidden totem. He glances back once at the stricken expression on Ghostbur’s face as Philza moves closer, his shadow falling over both of them. The anvil descends quietly, a soft exhale of breath.

_\---_

_(Something dead which still seems to be alive.)_

After the day Techno has had, he’s surprised he doesn’t collapse from exhaustion sooner. As it is, he manages to deal with Tommy for an excruciating amount of hours, most of which involved the blatant theft of his things and the startling discovery of Tommy’s secret room under his house, before Tommy finally goes to sleep and Techno slumps into the nearest chair. 

Then he feels a non-presence enter his house. There’s no other way to describe it. One moment he’s more or less alone and the next, there is that billowing pressure that feels like the distinct absence of something. It’s a feeling he has familiarized himself with as of late. He lifts his head and Ghostbur waves. 

“Hello,” he says cheerily. “Glad to see you back.”

“Hi, Ghostbur. If you don’t mind, I’m tryna sleep here.”

Ghostbur drifts closer, then stops. He’s staring at the floorboards in the corner. “Tommy’s here. That’s great.”

“Great isn’t really the word I would use.” Techno closes his eyes. “You really just show up at the worst moments, Ghostbur.”

“I’m ‘omeless.”

Techno opens his eyes. “Uh. Okay.” He bites back the words, _just stay here._ He doesn’t need another person to watch out for right now. And this isn’t like when they were kids, and spent all their time together. It would be weird now to live again under the same roof as his br—as a ghost. 

Ghostbur reaches towards the wall, then slowly pulls his hand back towards his chest, like he isn’t allowed to touch anything. Techno still doesn’t know how corporeal he is, and he doesn’t care to find out. “Tommy’s here, I want to talk to Tommy.”

“You can talk to him tomorrow. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled.” 

“Alright.” Ghostbur glides over to the corner and sits down, looking like he’s made himself comfortable. So this is Techno’s life now. Collecting strays. Collecting the disparate pieces of his old family.

Except Phil, evidently. He’ll have to make a plan to go back and save him at some point. “Hey, Ghostbur,” he says, twisting in his chair to face him. “Have you talked to Phil much?”

“Oh, a little,” he replies. 

“How . . . how has that been?”

“It’s been great. Why are you asking?”

Techno scoffs and, before he can stop himself, says, “‘Cause he killed you.”

“No.” The firmness in Ghostbur’s voice surprises him. “He killed Wilbur.”

“You are Wilbur.” Suddenly, Techno is tired of this. He is tired of soft-spoken, ditzy Ghostbur. He is tired of dancing around the gaps in his memory, making sure he never has to gaze directly at the massive fucking crater of what he did. Because if Wilbur won’t make peace with what happened, then how is Techno supposed to? 

He is too tired, even, to deal with the shame that burns through him as soon as that selfish thought crosses his mind. “You don’t just become someone new because you’ve died,” he says. “You don’t get to just get rid of who you were before the 16th.”

Ghostbur’s gaze, usually so distant and blank, solidifies and sharpens. “Neither do you, _brother_.” 

“Shut up.” Techno turns away. “I’m too tired to argue about this right now. I almost died today.”

“You did die today.”

“Eh, not really.”

“I watched it,” says Ghostbur. “I saw it.”

“Then I guess we’re even,” Techno snaps. Ghostbur goes silent. When Techno finally looks around again, he’s gone. 

The next morning, Ranboo returns with a peace offering in the form of some of Techno’s stolen stuff. Ghostbur comes back, too, and he and Tommy waste no time getting into another petty argument with no gravity in it. Tuning their incessant chatter out, Techno thinks, this’ll be alright, actually. They’ll be fine. 

But they won’t be a family again. They can’t be, not after everything they’ve done.

_\---_

_(An emotion suspended in time.)_

Techno comes back from the community house seething, and Phil is there at his home, working outside. 

“Hey,” says Techno, striding up to him. “Things are goin’ badly.”

“Oh.” Phil’s eyebrows raise. “That’s not good.” He glances over Techno’s shoulder. “Where’s Tommy?”

What a good question. The question of the day, really. Where’s Tommy, what the hell is he doing, does Techno’s trust and support really matter so little compared to his great L’Manberg? “He’s gone.” 

“What?”

He shoulders past Phil, intending to head inside, then jerks to a stop. Looming silently in the background is Dream, who seems to have taken up looming silently in the background as a great source of enjoyment lately. He waves genially. Techno looks from Dream back to Phil, whose expression is as shuttered and imperceptible as Dream’s mask. 

“Hey, Dream,” Techno says. “By the way, thanks for abandonin' me at the community house with, like, thirty guys who all wanted to kill me.”

Dream tilts his head. “Oh, yeah. I didn’t think about that.” He doesn’t offer an apology. Techno doesn’t expect one. 

“What do you mean about Tommy?” Phil interjects. 

Techno does not want to have this conversation—well, not at all, but certainly not in front of Dream, whose mask can’t even hide the fact that he’s obviously paying close attention, holding himself perfectly still and turned towards them. “He’s just gone,” Techno says calmly. “And he’s not comin’ back.” 

“Huh,” says Phil. “Alright.” 

“Alright,” Techno echoes, and then turns fully to Dream. “So what’s our plan to destroy L’Manberg?”

…

The night before they set out to destroy that country for what feels like the fiftieth time, Techno doesn’t sleep. Part of it is because he’s busy obsessing over the finer details of their plan, hammering them all into shape in his mind. Part of it is because he’s expecting a nightly visit from Ghostbur. 

But Ghostbur doesn’t come. 

After a while, though, a door creaks upstairs, and Philza slowly drops down the ladder. He startles when he sees Techno awake and at the table, but then he walks over and sits down across from him. “I didn’t know you were up.”

“Can’t sleep.”

“Thinking about tomorrow?”

“Yeah.” Then, because it’s been a long time since he and Phil have been able to have a private conversation and he’s not quite sure if there will be a tomorrow after tomorrow for either of them, he adds, “Waitin’ for someone.”

Phil says, “Tommy?” and catches him completely off guard. 

It’s not like he and Tommy have much of a relationship in the first place. Techno was pretty much moved out and moved on by the time Tommy came around. With Techno and Wilbur, you could tell they were brothers, twins. They borrowed from each other’s vocabularies and mannerisms, they messed with each other and relied on each other like brothers. With Tommy, Techno always felt a little held at arms’ length, although it was probably him doing the holding. Maybe it was because Wilbur was always closer to Tommy than he was. And maybe Tommy was closer to Wilbur than he was, too. 

Then again, whose fault is that? He is the one who flew the nest first, off to carve his reputation into the world on his own. Years went by where he didn’t see his family, where no one knew him as a brother or a son but just as the Blade. By the time he came back, he was coming back as a mercenary more than a sibling. He knew how they thought of him. He was coming back for Pogtopia, for anarchy; he wasn’t coming back for Wilbur and Tommy. 

So he sowed the seeds of Tommy’s disposal of him, yet here he is now, bemoaning the fact that he has to reap exactly what he deserves. Phil is watching him closely, his brow furrowed, so Techno just says, “No. I don’t expect him to ever come back.” He waves a hand. “Not that I would even want him to.”

“Hey, come on. You don’t know that.”

“You weren’t there,” says Techno. He means at the community house. He means before the 16th. _And the one time you were there,_ he doesn’t say, _was in that room._

“I know. But Tommy’s . . . you know, I really thought you all would look after each other.” 

Techno shakes his head and looks down at the table. “We’re not really a family anymore.”

Phil says nothing for a little while. He drums his fingers on the table. The moon moves across the sky; silver splashes of light slither inside the window and spill across the table. Then Phil says, “It’s not too late to change that.”

Techno scoffs. “Seems pretty late to me. You know, considering Wilbur’s gone. Can’t be a brother to a dead guy.”

“Tommy isn’t dead.”

Techno slams his fist against the table and the moonlight wavers like a puddle as the wood shivers. “Like I said, Tommy isn’t comin’ back.”

“Once upon a time, we said that about you.”

They fall silent again. As is expected. A chasm widens between them and neither of them know how to place a bridge that won’t inevitably burn. 

Finally, Techno says, “It doesn’t matter. If Tommy doesn’t hate me now, he certainly will tomorrow.”

Phil narrows his eyes. “You sure about tomorrow?”

This is not what he expected to hear from Phil, who has always been recklessly trigger-happy. Who hasn’t even hesitated to do worse things than blow up an already blown up country. “You’re not gettin’ cold feet on me,” he says. 

Phil shrugs. “If you’re destroying it because it’s L’Manberg, then I’ll gladly join you. After what that place did to Wilbur, of course I’ll join you. But if this is about getting back at Tommy, that’s something else entirely.” He fixes Techno with a steady, stern look, the closest thing to a Fatherly Glare that Phil’s weilded against him in ages. All of the sudden Techno is a kid again, sitting sullenly at the dinner table as Phil reprimands him for using Wilbur as target practice (who had armor on, and was too quick, and was fine, anyway). 

Except he isn’t a kid anymore, and he doesn’t really like thinking of Phil as his father lately, and Wilbur is not fine. Wilbur is gone. 

“Don’t let yourself get blinded by everything that’s gone wrong,” Phil says. “Don’t do this for the wrong reasons.”

“Or what?” says Techno, voice low and cold. “Gonna kill me, too?”

Phil’s eyes widen in shock. Instantly, Techno regrets saying it. “Never mind,” he mutters. “Forget I said anything.” This is the closest they’ve come to talking about what happened to Wilbur since Phil held the sword. With Phil staring at him like that, Techno remembers why he has avoided it for so long. He doesn’t want to bring this up and hash it out. If he does, he’ll have to either forgive Phil or resolve to resent him for the rest of his life. He can’t handle either of those things. 

Silence swells between them, as disruptive as an explosion. 

After a while, Techno clears his throat. “You ever heard of the myth of the house of Atreus? Specifically, the end of it?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Ah well,” he says. “Probably doesn’t mean anythin’ anyway.” 

_\---_

_(Like a blurred photograph.)_

Tommy stands across from Techno, on one of the few remaining pillars of stable ground left in L’Manberg. His face is screwed up in anger, one hand gripping his sword, the other pointing at Techno.

“Just listen to me!” he shouts. His voice cuts through the cacophony of explosions and the withers’ shadows trailing over the ground, blotting out the sky like stormclouds. “You _were_ my friend, Techno—”

“I listened to you for weeks,” Techno interrupts. His talk with Phil last night stirred up his anger, and Ghostbur’s lack of appearance only made him feel worse, somehow. Now, standing amidst the destruction of L’Manberg, he supposes that he should be happy with how things are going. But he’s not. Tommy won’t let him be.

“I was there for you,” he continues, “and what did you do? You went back to Tubbo! Tubbo, who exiled you, who threw you away, who chose a country over you!” Techno grips his crossbow hard enough that he feels the edges of the wood dig into his skin. “You can forgive him for that? You can betray your own brother for him?” 

“My own—?” Tommy lets out a shout of rage. “You’ve never treated me like a brother! You never—you can’t only care about me when it suits you, Technoblade! That’s selfish, you’re _selfish._ ” 

“Tommy—”

“You didn’t care about being my brother when you killed Tubbo! You didn’t care about being my brother when Wilbur died!” 

Rage coils like a clenched fist in Techno’s chest. He shouts back, “You didn’t care about being my brother either! You and Wilbur only thought about your stupid government! You couldn’t care less about me. But yesterday? At the community house? _I was there for you_. I would have fought them all for you. You wouldn’t do that for me.”

“Because you’re _wrong!_ You’re in the wrong, Techno, and when someone’s wrong you have to stand up to them even if—no, especially if they’re your family. You—you’ve always been my brother.” Tommy’s voice cracks and he falls abruptly silent, as if momentarily shocked by the force of it. “You were my brother when we watched him die—” Tommy stops, lowers his voice, and he’s almost drowned out by the sounds of the TNT but Techno couldn’t stop hearing this if he tried— “And you were my brother when you walked away.”

Techno goes still. It is not the stillness of a predator down on its haunches, but the stillness of a spotted, trapped prey. Looking at the twisted expression of grief and anger on Tommy’s face, a missing piece of the puzzle crashes into place. On the 16th, he and Tommy stood there and watched Wilbur kill himself for the sake of destroying L’Manberg—and in Tommy’s eyes, by continuing to destroy L’Manberg Techno has deemed that final moment, Phil and Wilbur and the button room, as acceptable. 

Techno lowers his crossbow. How can they look at the same thing and see it so differently? How can they still be brothers now, after everything, after this? How strong does a tether have to be to withstand so much misunderstanding and betrayal?

How close to tearing is it, then, and does he have time to fix it?

A wither flies by overhead. He probably does not have time to fix it. Tommy is still standing like he’s braced for a fight. Techno glances up at the sky. Dream is somewhere up there, and Dream is certainty not going to stop now. Phil might. If Techno tells him what Wilbur never did—that he has been here at this precipice so many times, but now he has changed his mind. 

Although he’s completely out in the open, Techno feels the crushing pressure of the cramped button room’s walls around his head. “I know you won’t understand this,” he calls to Tommy, “but this is the only other option I have now.” 

He turns and walks away. 

_\---_

_(Like an insect trapped in amber.)_

Dream doesn’t let him get far. At the nether portal that will take him to the north, Dream materializes out of thin air and steps in front of the swirling, purple sheen. “What are you doing?” His mask is speckled with ash and dust. His axe is in his hand—not held at the ready, but that doesn’t reassure Techno that this won’t turn into a fight. He wraps his own hand around the hilt of his sword and Dream doesn’t react, which tells him Dream is thinking the same thing. 

“Goin’ home,” he says. “It’s been a long day.”

“Day isn’t over yet.”

“It is for me.” 

Dream doesn’t say anything for a long time. Close by, TNT booms. Withers screech. Techno waits; he won’t be baited into making a wrong move. 

Finally, Dream either caves or starts stringing together a new plan entirely. “Isn’t this what you wanted? Complete destruction of the government that ruined everything? That tried to kill you? That did kill your brother?”

The last dying embers of rage reignite in Techno’s chest, but he keeps his voice even when he says, “I want the country destroyed, not the people. So, I think we did enough damage for today, don’t you think? My work here is done.” He goes to push past Dream, but Dream’s hand snakes out and grabs his shoulder. He’s surprisingly strong; he holds Techno in place. 

“They’re never gonna understand this lesson,” he says slowly, “unless you grind it into the bedrock itself. If you back out now, they’ll just make another country. They won’t be afraid of you anymore if they see you running away—and from Tommy, of all people.”

Techno fixes him with a cold, unyielding glare. “You just don’t understand, Dream. You have no one.”

Dream scoffs. “Uh, I have everyone, actually. This is my SMP.”

“Sure, you own the place. But there’s not a single person in here who really cares about you anymore.” He jerks out of Dream’s grasp. “I’ll tear down any government they try to prop up, but I know it’s about more than that for you. So if you think you can use me as a way to get to Tommy, then you’re not as smart as you think you are. ‘Cause I’m not gonna let you do that.” 

“Hm.” Dream lowers his hand. His axe still hangs by his side, unmoving. “This is where you draw the line? Really?”

He shrugs. “Hey, people change.” After Wilbur, after the withers, after today, it’s hard to believe there is still time to change. But time doesn’t tunnel and collapse when you make a mistake, when you cross a line that you might not be able to cross back over—it just keeps moving. Maybe one day, it will carry him far enough away from his deeds, good and bad, that he can just set them down. Lay them to rest. Or maybe he hasn’t gone too far yet to squander the chance at reaching back and putting things right. 

The only thing time guarantees is closure. Forgiveness, absolution, change, you gotta work for. You have to turn around and face them. 

“You know,” he says to Dream, “have you ever stopped to think that you might be goin’ too far?”

But Dream just laughs. “Why would I stop to think about that when I’m having so much fun?” Then he moves to the side, sweeping one arm towards the nether portal in a melodramatic gesture, though his voice is cold and flat. “Goodbye, Technoblade. I’m sure I’ll see you again soon.”

Techno narrows his eyes, then steps into the nether portal. He shifts so he doesn’t turn his back to Dream, but Dream doesn’t jump him while he’s distracted. He just leans on his axe and watches as Techno disappears. 

Techno steps out of the portal and into the snow, thoroughly confused and more than a little unnerved and so very, very exhausted. He barely pays attention to his surroundings as he lumbers through the snow, keeping an eye out just for the sight of his chimney rising over the snowy hills. When he gets back, he’ll wait it out, let the dust settle, then reach out to Tommy. Try to reconcile what they can; he couldn’t accept what Wilbur’s L’Manberg had turned into, but maybe, just maybe, there’s some hope for Tommy’s L’Manberg. They might be able to reach some understanding. They’re brothers, after all. The skeleton of a family still exists somewhere, fossilized in the ashes of what he and Phil and Wilbur burned. 

When he finally reaches his home, he’s surprised to see that the lights are on. Keeping a hand near the hilt of his sword, he throws the doors open. Ghostbur whirls around, startled, translucent in the lamplight. Then his face breaks open into an expression of pure joy. “Technoblade!” he says, drifting over. “It’s been too long.” 

“Yeah,” says Techno. “It has.” And he reaches out to put his hand on his brother’s shoulder.

\---

“ _So years have carried you, far beyond_

_the site of your old derailment,_

_the place where once you caused_

_harm to yourself and others;_

_it is behind you now,_

_and the damage, behind us all._ ” 

\- Robyn Sarah, “As a Storm-lopped Tree”

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading :))


End file.
